


7 Days To Transform Your Life

by rosa_himmelblau



Category: Wiseguy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-22
Updated: 2019-07-22
Packaged: 2020-07-11 15:34:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,135
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19930390
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosa_himmelblau/pseuds/rosa_himmelblau
Summary: So what would a Sonny Steelgrave do, if he didn't die at the end?





	7 Days To Transform Your Life

The first two times he typed it, Vince found typos, and he had to start again.

The third time the typing was perfect, but he crumpled it up anyway. It sounded too official. It didn’t explain anything. It was going to give Frank a heart attack.

When he typed it the fourth time, it said the same thing, but he knew he wasn’t going to mail it. He was going to hand deliver it, with a less formal explanation.

"Vince, what am I doing here?” Good thing it was raining; otherwise Frank would have looked ridiculous sneaking in with his coat pulled over his head. "This isn’t smart, this could blow your cover, me being seen coming to your apartment—"

"Come on in," Vince said, shutting the door behind Frank.

He went to the bathroom and found a big, heavy towel, which he gave to Frank. "How is it that a guy who's such a disciple of preparedness never has an umbrella?" Vince asked while Frank dried himself off. "I mean, I don't think I've ever seen you with one. Why is that, Frank?"

"This is why I had to come over and risk your cover, so you could heckle me? You couldn't do that over the phone?" Frank was briskly rubbing his head with the towel. When he finished, his hair stood up like a lot of weeds. Vince had to restrain himself from smoothing it down. Frank took off his wet coat and thrust it at Vince. "Do you have someplace you can put this where it'll dry?"

"Well, if you'd stayed in your house, you wouldn't'a gotten wet, so what would I have to heckle you about?" Vince took the coat and hung it on the shower curtain rod, near the heating vent.

"Oh, I'm sure you could have found something. Now, what's the big emergency? You're not even working on anything right now."

"Let's sit down," Vince said, trying not to sound as worried as he felt. He reached over and smoothed Frank's hair, winning himself a strange look. "Sorry. I—uh, I got something for you." Vince took the letter out of his pocket, but he didn't hand it to Frank.

Frank was polishing his glasses. When he finished with them, and had put them back on, he looked at Vince. "Traditionally, when you have something for someone, you don't just announce the fact. Giving it to them is part of the ritual."

"It's a letter," Vince said. "But I don't want to give it to you until I explain it."

"I know what a letter is, Vince. An explanation really isn't necessary."

God, he was being a pain in the ass. "I mean, I need to explain what's in it."

"Used a lot of big words, did you?"

Vince found himself feeling so irrationally crazy about Frank, he wanted to smile, but under the circumstances that didn't seem appropriate. "It's my resignation," he said seriously. "I didn't want to just—"

"Your what?" Frank pounced on the word.

"My resignation. I'm leaving the Bureau."

Frank stopped making snarky remarks. Frank stopped talking at all, he just looked at Vince with his mouth open. Vince wanted to try to explain—that had been the whole point of having Frank come over—but with Frank not saying anything, explaining felt like throwing himself into a vacuum. Or maybe a volcano.

"Would you mind telling me why you would want to leave the Bureau?" Frank asked in that quiet way that meant danger, and then, "Elias is going to have a coronary."

"That's not a bad reason, but it’s not why I'm doing it," Vince said, hoping Frank would smile. Frank looked at him like he was an idiot. "I got offered another job."

"Doing what?" Frank yelped. "The whole world thinks you're in the mob, what could you get a job offer for, breaking legs for Rudy Aiuppo?"

"No, it's a legitimate job offer. I mean, it's for a legitimate job. And it comes from someone who knows what I really do for a living."

"Who did you tell?" Frank was on his feet, yelling at him. "Dammit, Vince, how could you break your— Who did you tell?"

"I didn't tell him, Frank, he found out—"

"Steelgrave." Frank couldn't have sounded more disgusted if Vince had said he was going to work for Ivan the Terrible. "Vince—"

"Shut up, Frank, you can yell at me when I'm done talking."

Frank looked recalcitrant, but he sat down. "Talk."

Again it seemed harder to talk to Frank while Frank wasn't saying anything. It was easier to argue with Frank than it was to talk to him. "I've been visiting Sonny—"

"I know all about it Vince, you see him every week. But does he really need a driver where he is? The New Jersey State Penitentiary seems small enough that he could just walk—"

"He's getting out," Vince said. And that really shut Frank up.

The first time Vinnie went to visit Sonny in prison, Sonny had refused to see him.

The second time, he'd stayed just long enough to tell Vinnie not to come back. The third time, he'd been faintly amused, and more exasperated than annoyed. "Jesus, kid, you don't gotta take it this far. You keep my secret, I'll keep yours. Now go home."

It was the same secret, that Vinnie was an OCB agent. Vinnie wanted it kept so he could go on with his career; Sonny wanted to keep it so he could go on with his life. It had been part of the plea bargain.

Aldo's disappearance—and his lack of intelligence—played nicely into the whole plan. Since nobody could find him, setting him up as the fall guy worked very well, and when presented with the evidence against them, neither Mahoney nor Baglia wanted to take their chances at trial. Not even Joey could deny his son was the kind'a guy to say the wrong things to the wrong people, trying to make himself look important. Only Sonny knew Vinnie was a federal agent, and he wasn't telling.

Sonny's lawyers had done a great job brokering his plea agreement. They hadn't been too impressed with the way a certain federal agency had allowed their client's life to be endangered just to further its investigation, and they were very good at persuading the D. A. that a jury wouldn't look too favorably on it either. Paul Patrice had been planning to murder Mr. Steelgrave, and the authorities had only half-heartedly tried to prevent him from doing so. Since Vinnie hadn't had a gun at the party, it was a pretty compelling argument.

That left Sonny doing the short time Vinnie had been angling to get him, and Sonny's cooperation had kept Frank from imploding over it. Everybody walked away—well, not happy, but everybody walked away, even if Sonny was walking into prison for seven years.

Vinnie kept his cover as Sonny's right hand. He wasn't doing time because his lawyer had gotten him a better deal than Sonny's had. He moved on to other investigations; he was instrumental in making cases against, among others, Albert Cerrico, and keeping the heroin he was smuggling off the streets. And once a week, when he could, Vinnie went to visit Sonny. Life went on.

It took nearly a year before Sonny stopped sniping at Vinnie whenever he saw an opening. Vinnie got pretty good at not answering back, figuring that he had, after all, won, and Sonny had reason to be pissed at him. Besides, he didn't go there to argue with Sonny. He went there to—

He went there to see him. Because he liked him. It took a little while for Vinnie to let himself acknowledge this, but it was true. He liked Sonny, and he enjoyed spending time with him, even if it was talking over a telephone with a piece of bulletproof glass between them.

He hadn't known Frank had known, but why wouldn't Frank know? Frank knew everything, didn't he, and Vinnie had to sign in when he went to visit Sonny. But why would the prison officials keep Frank informed of who visited Sonny?

"What do you mean, he's getting out?" Frank asked. He looked at the cup of coffee in his hand as though he had no idea how it had gotten there, though Vinnie had asked if he'd wanted one, and gone, and gotten it, and handed it to him. "It hasn't been seven years." He looked at the coffee suspiciously, then drank some of it.

"No, but he's up for parole, and it sounds like there's a good chance he'll get it. He's been very cooperative. Not about mob guys, but he gave the federal prosecutor all kinds of information about judges and other public officials on his payroll. And what do you mean, you already knew I'd been seeing him? How did you know?"

"I told them to let me know if you went to visit. I figured you would, to assuage some of that guilt you were carrying, and I wanted to be able to watch you, make sure you were one hundred percent before you went back out again. So, they let me know. And then they let me know again. And they kept letting me know until I finally told them to cut it out, to let me know if you stopped going to see him, and then I never heard from them again. I'm not stupid, you know," Frank made a helpless gesture with both hands, spilling coffee on Vinnie's rug.

"I never said you were." Vinnie ignored the coffee on his rug.

"So you've been going to visit him every week for the last—"

"Pretty much," Vince forestalled. Frank was going to ask him why, and Frank wasn't going to like the answer, if Vince told him, which maybe he wouldn't. "And don't start with me. It's none of your business."

"I'm your—"

"You're my former field director," Vince interrupted. "And if this was your business before, you should have said something earlier. It's too late now."

"And just what is it you're going to be doing for Steelgrave?" Frank demanded.

"You're going to do what?" Vinnie asked, and he was trying so hard not to laugh, he was afraid he was going to strain something.

There wasn't much point to it anyway, since Sonny knew he wanted to laugh. Vinnie could see it on his face. "Motivational speaking," Sonny said off-handedly, as though he didn't care that Vinnie was seconds away from cracking up.

"Motivational speaking? You mean like, how to win friends and influence people?" Vinnie asked, actually getting the words out before he lost it. The guard was glaring at him, as were the other visitors. Nobody was supposed to be having this good a time inside a prison, even if they were only a visitor.

Sonny hung the phone back up, waiting patiently—well, his version of patiently—while Vinnie laughed. Vinnie picked up the receiver a couple of times, but he couldn't say anything and had to put it back down again. His stomach had started to hurt by the time he was able to speak again. Sonny just glared at him a few minutes before picking up his receiver. "You about done?"

"I think so. I'm just—" Vinnie tried biting the inside of his mouth, but it didn't help much. "You talk," he said at last, and Sonny did, telling him about some promoter who had contacted him about going on some kind of tour when he got out.

The money was great—totally legit—and he'd be put up in the nicest hotels. "All I gotta do is get up and talk about how to motivate your employees."

"Yeah," Vinnie agreed, and his voice was a ridiculous squeak from trying not to laugh. He cleared his throat and tried again. "Yeah, but Sonny—" And he was laughing again.

"What?" Sonny demanded, pissy and starting to get really angry. "Huh? What's so funny about this?"

"Nothin', it's just—well, as I remember, your idea of how to motivate your employees was, 'I pay you, you do what I say.' I don't think anybody's gonna pay you big bucks to hear that."

"You think that's all there is to it?" Sonny asked, and before Vinnie could answer, Sonny had hung up

The next week Vinnie didn't laugh and Sonny elaborated on his ideas. They sounded as stupid to Vinnie as all those one-minute-manager, think-your-way-to-success books—the ones that showed up on the best seller lists all the time. So when Sonny was finished talking, Vinnie said with all sincerity that it sounded great.

"So, you want your old job back?" Sonny asked casually, as though it didn't matter to him if Vinnie said no.

"My old job?" Vinnie asked, confused for a moment, then realizing what Sonny was talking about.

"Yeah, well, I'm gonna need some protection. And it's not like I'll be doing anything that goes against your—" Sonny waved a hand, as though scruples were too silly a thing to even bother naming. "And you're not bad to have around," he added. "You'll go on my expense account."

That last part made Vinnie laugh, but not uncontrollably. "So we'd have to figure out just how much I'm worth," he said.

"Yeah, and just what your duties are," Sonny added, and Vinnie felt a strange heat go through him.

"And what my hours would be," Vinnie said firmly. "Because I wouldn't be working for you twenty-four hours a day."

"No, you wouldn't," Sonny said, smiling at him.

"He's going to be a what?" Frank asked, and his voice had the same squeak to it Vince's had. "Is this some elaborate practical joke?"

Vince shook his head. "It's the real deal, Frank. I talked to the promoter myself. This job's one of the reasons he's likely to get paroled, that and his record of good behavior."

"And you're going to be his bodyguard?" Frank asked. "Have you completely lost your mind?"

Vince shrugged. "I dunno. Maybe. It sounds like fun. And come on, Frank, we know I can't stay undercover forever."

"There are other assignments," Frank said. "You could—"

"I could what? Do you really see me as a field director? I don't have the discipline, and we both know it."

Frank didn't say anything; Vince had effectively taken the wind out of his sails.

"Have you talked to your family about this?” he asked at last.

Vince shrugged. He didn’t want to talk about the argument he’d had with his brother, about redemption, about career choices, about making his own decisions. It had started badly and ended worse. Vinnie hoped they’d be able to patch things up, but he was tired of having his every decision treated like a mistake made by a stupid child. “Don’t worry about it, huh, Frank? I got it covered.” And before Frank could argue, he asked, "How soon can we go give Daryl a coronary?"

Epilogue

Vinnie pulled off his tie and threw it across the room, saw Sonny’s look, and went to pick it up. “Who’re you, the maid?”

“You keep losing those damn things,” Sonny said. “You wouldn’t have to spend twenty minutes looking for it if you didn’t throw it behind the sofa.”

Vinnie didn’t say he had so many neckties, losing a few didn’t make any difference.

The light on the phone was flashing. Vinnie called and got the message while Sonny went the bedroom to change clothes. No matter how late they got back, no matter how soon they were going to bed, Sonny always changed his clothes rather than just getting ready for bed. Vinnie didn’t know why he did it, but he liked thinking about asking.

It was Uncle Mike’s private number, but Vinnie still felt a little nervous calling. The second he heard Uncle Mike’s voice, all that went away. “It’s me,” he said.

“How’s my errant nephew? I saw you on TV tonight, you’re lookin’ good.”

“We were on TV?” Vinnie asked.

“Yeah, one of the local news stations did a piece on motivational speakers, and Sonny was one of them. And there you were in the background, looking very serious. Would’ve made me think twice about taking a shot at him.”

Vinnie laughed. “Glad to know I’m earning my pay.”

“So, has Sonny tried to kill you yet?”

“Oh, you know. Once or twice he's put a pillow over my face, but I always wake up and stop him. I think he's getting discouraged.”

Uncle Mike laughed. “I'll be sure to tell Frank.” That had been Frank's final argument against Vince going to work for Sonny, that it was all an elaborate plot to kill Vince. He’d dropped it when both Vinnie and Uncle Mike had made fun of him.

“Thanks. So, uh, is Frank still mad at me?”

“Vince, Frank isn't mad at you. He never was.” Vinnie answered that with an eloquent silence, and Uncle Mike sighed. “Yeah, all right, he was. How're things going with your family?”

“They're not mad at me either,” Vinnie sighed.

“Sorry to hear that.”

Sonny was back in the room, prowling around and wearing his patented "you should be paying attention to me" look. “Who’s on the phone?”

Vinnie put his hand over the mouthpiece. "It's my Uncle Mike.”

"You don't have an Uncle Mike."

"Yeah? You wanna tell him that?"

“No. Say hi for me. Oh, did you call for room service?”

“Yeah, it should be here in a few minutes.”

“You need to go?” Uncle Mike asked.

“Nah, I’m good. So far the most dangerous thing about this gig is forgetting to order dinner before we go out. Sonny gets cranky.”

“Hey!” Sonny picked up a throw pillow, and threw it at Vinnie.

“So, how are Sonny's speeches?” Uncle Mike asked.

“Oh, uh, yeah, that’s really great,” Vinnie said.

“That bad?” Uncle Mike asked.

“Yeah, well, about what you’d expect.”

Sonny, bored with Vinnie’s lack of attention, went into the bedroom, and in a moment Vinnie heard the TV come on. "Tell you the truth, Uncle, Sonny’s speeches are a lot of bullshit. But he’s very charming, so between that and the whole fascination that comes with being a former capo, nobody seems to notice. And Sonny’s having a good time.”

"And what about you, son? Are you having a good time?"

Vinnie thought about how to say it. He knew it looked like a very empty life, all glitz and glamour with no substance. And with anybody else, it would have been.

Sonny was the substance.

"Yeah, Uncle, I’m having a really good time. Say hi to Frank for me. Tell him to give me a call sometime.”

“Will do, Vince.”

**Author's Note:**

> But wait! There's more!
> 
> The story behind this story is probably better than this story. I was at lunch one day with a bunch of women from work, one of whom was just back from vacation. Her husband’s an insurance salesman, and they’d been to a convention—the only fun one he goes to, she says. Anyway, while they were there, she went with him to one of the sessions, which was a talk by some motivational speaker who—you guessed it!—was a former Mafia don. (Former? we asked. How do you become a former Mafia don—and still have a career? She didn’t have an answer to that.)
> 
> Anyway, she noticed that there was a man who kept staring at her very suspiciously, and eventually he came over and asked her who she was. He was the speaker’s bodyguard, and he was suspicious of her because she didn’t have a nametag. Once she told him she was married to one of the attendees, and showed him her I.D., everything was fine.
> 
> Now, this story was good enough, but there was an even better ending. The bodyguard was a former FBI agent, the one who arrested the speaker.
> 
> If there is anything in the world that proves the level of my self-control, it’s that I didn’t laugh during any of this. I kept a straight face and acted nicely interested. And through it all I just kept thinking, “I want to see Sonny as a motivational speaker, with Vinnie as his bodyguard!”


End file.
